Page 25

She entered the morning room and closed the door, grateful to find it empty. Crossing to the escritoire beside the windows, she opened the household ledger and made a creditable pretence of examining the butcher’s account whilst listening for footsteps in the corridor.

None came.

Judith remained where she was for another moment, annoyed with herself.

She had passed messages for nearly five months without once creeping through her own house like a burglar. Baines had not even completed his first morning at Blackthorn, yet she was already behaving as though guilt must surely be writ across her face.

She pulled open the shallow drawer beneath the escritoire and took out a sheet of ordinary writing paper. She fingered the smooth surface for a moment, thoughts flying like gnats. Why should she not continue? After all, what she intended to write would not harm anyone.

Judith reminded herself of that fact whenever conscience chose to be troublesome. She had never passed on military plans, troop numbers, government deliberations, Cabinet business, or anything which might put soldiers or officials in danger. Indeed, she had neither access to the greater part of such matters nor any wish to possess it.

The information she passed on was facts: the price of grain; the closing of a mill; wage reductions; parish relief; and the names of landlords who complained bitterly of disorder whilst privately taking advantage of the desperation which caused it.

Gentlemen discussed such matters over port as though the people affected were figures in a ledger rather than men and women attempting to feed their children, and because Judith happened to sit quietly at the edge of their conversations, they frequently forgot she had ears.

The previous evening, Lord Cranford had spoken at considerable length about several Yorkshire manufacturers who intended to lower wages again. He had been drinking sufficiently to make him expansive, though not enough to improve his accuracy, and Sir George Wycliffe had corrected him twice. Between them, they had revealed that at least two mill owners intended to petition Parliament for financial relief, on the grounds of poor Continental trade, even though one had recently secured a profitable government contract.

Lord Cranford had considered the contradiction amusing. Judith had not. Nor had she found it amusing when the gentlemen later discussed grain merchants near Newcastle who were retaining stores in anticipation of prices rising further should disturbances in Scotland interfere with ordinary transport.

Perhaps there was nothing illegal in it. Perhaps gentlemen in London would call it prudent commerce.

Judith called it making bread dearer in cottages where there was already not enough of it.

She dipped her pen in the ink-horn.

Ordinarily, she might have included greater detail, but Major Baines’ arrival required caution. She therefore wrote slowly, choosing each phrase with care.

Reliable report suggests several Yorkshire manufacturers intend further reductions in wages whilst seeking parliamentary relief. Claims of declining Continental orders may not apply equally to all concerns. Those speaking for the workers would do well to request that the accounts be examined before relief is granted.

She paused, reading the lines again.

Nothing dangerous; no names or secrets. Breathing a little more freely, she continued.

There is also reason to believe certain grain merchants are retaining stores in expectation of increased prices should disturbances in the north interfere with ordinary carriage. Public attention to the practice may discourage it.

Judith placed the pen aside.

If the information reached the person she intended it to, perhaps questions would be asked. A sympathetic Member of Parliament might raise the matter. A newspaper might investigate. A magistrate might discover that the people who deplored public disorder most loudly occasionally profited very well from the conditions which produced it.

Such inquiry was all she had ever intended.

The whole business had begun because no one had listened when she spoke of such matters herself.

As Sir Lionel’s unmarried niece, Judith occupied a peculiar position. She was respectable enough to be present almost everywhere and sufficiently unimportant to be forgotten once she was there. Gentlemen who lowered their voices when a footman entered the room would continue speaking without reserve when Judith poured tea. They discussed rents, wages, elections, reforms, magistrates, and military measures while she arranged cards or made certain the decanter went round, because a woman who understood household accounts could not possibly have any interest in the larger accounts of the country.

She had once thought little of it. Then Sir Barnaby Croft had visited Blackthorn.

A Lancashire mill had recently closed, leaving some two hundred families without regular employment, and Sir Barnaby had complained at dinner that the resulting disturbances made travelling in the district exceedingly inconvenient.

Judith had asked what the families were expected to do. He had looked at her as though a chair had unexpectedly spoken. “What can they do, my dear Miss Finch? They must seek employment elsewhere.”

“In a district where three mills have already closed?”

Sir Barnaby had shrugged. “Then they must remove to another.”

The ease with which he said it had disturbed her for days. Two hundred families were not chessmen to be shifted from one square to another. They had homes, relations, debts, elderly parents, children, and all the small connections which made one place belong to them and another not.

The following week, Judith had written to an old school friend whose brother occasionally contributed to a reform-minded newspaper. She described the conditions without revealing where she had heard them. The matter appeared in print. A subscription was raised for several of the affected families.